Allan Gartner's pages about wiring for DCC present a method by which a Pilz Elite turnout can be made even more DCC friendly. I have an even better method. Rather than removing the jumpers under the frog, adding jumpers to the closure rails, and using insulated joiners beyond the frog, I suggest the following. Simply insert a very thin insulator between the two jumpers under the frog and another very thin insulator between the two rails that make up the point of the frog. As manufactured, there is a very small gap there and a thin piece of plastic will do the trick. This eliminates the need for powering the frog from the switch machine, and the turnout is completely DCC friendly.

-- Wayne Elliott (welliott@cowtown.net), February 01, 2002

Answers

I tried doing just that but discovered that wide steel wheel treads sometimes touched both of the frog rails just as they passed the frog point. This caused visible sparking. If it occurred slow enough the DCC booster tripped out. It really needs a short plastic frog point to avoid this problem.

The jumpers under the frog on one of my Elite switches were buried in the plastic, making insertion of an insulating barrier difficult until I loosened it up a little w/ a hot foam cutter.

Walthers/Shinohara crossovers have a similar problem. You need to throw all 4 switches to avoid momentary shorts as steel wheels roll through the diamond. [unmodified double crossover]

-- Don Vollrath (dvollrath@magnetek.com), February 01, 2002.